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In 1857, 4 years after
the death of Gangadhar Rao, mutiny broke out among some sepoys of the Army.
The mutiny was limited to the north of India, mainly the Gangetic Plain.
It broke out first in Meerut on 10th May.

There were several instances of mutineers
turning on their prisoners and the European women and children. There were
many atrocities. Some British escaped with the aid of local people, often
at no little risk to themselves.

When news of the mutiny in Meerut reached
Jhansi, the Rani asked permission to raise a small bodyguard for her own
protection, a measure to which Captain Skene readily agreed. Skene and
the other British officers failed to take the Rani's lead to protect theselves
against a possible mutiny.

On June 5th, some time after the mutiny
broke out elsewhere, members of the Jhansi garrison mutinied, took the
more important of the two forts in the town, killing two of the British
officers and wounding another. They plundered the town, and released the
prisoners from the gaol. The remaining British and Eurasians sheltered
in the other fort, the Town Fort. There were 61 people, over half of them
women and children. One or two others sheltered in the town and were able
to escape with the aid of local people. The survivors in the Town Fort
appealed to the Rani for help.

It is not obvious what she could do, she
had a limited military force, the small bodyguard granted by the British
at the outset of the mutiny, at her disposal, and no obvious political
influence over the mutineers. They owed no allegiance to the Rani.

Her actual response is unknown, there are
several versions. Antonia Fraser's favoured version is 'What can I do?
... If you wish to save yourself, abandon the fort, no-one will injure
you'. I assume that at the time the mutineers were not acting against the
fort, and that she was stating that the people of Jhansi would not harm
them. In this respect she could grant them the implied safe conduct, but
whatever she replied they choose to stay put.

On
the 7th June, the Town Fort was besieged by the mutineers and the fort
surrendered. Safe passage was granted by the mutineers, but just outside
Jhansi, in the Jokan Bagh, one of the rebel leaders ordered their deaths.

The Rani gave the mutineers money, by her own
admission, but only under the threat of deposing her in favour of a relative
of Gangadhar Rao's, Sadasheo Rao Narain, and, possibly, her own death. A Mr
Thornton, the Deputy Collector of Jhansi, reported
that she had given the money as payment for the massacre which had been
entirely at her instigation. (Some British historians, subsequently pushed
this further, or at least misinterpreted it, and made her responsible for
the mutiny itself.) Thornton can at best have been reporting hearsay as
he could not possibly have been a witness.

The mutineers then left for Agra and Delhi
to join up with the main body of the rebellion on the 11th June.

On the 12th June the Rani wrote a letter
to the British giving an account of what had happened, the steps she has
taken to stabilise the situation and asking for help. To me this letter
is quite emotional, showing an agitated state of mind. But notwithstanding
that she is already taking control of the situation.

She wrote a second
letter on the 14th June with a similar theme. She reported on the status
of Jhansi, again asked the British for help and for orders.
This letter is calmer and more business like and shows that she had been
very busy in establishing a new administration in Jhansi.

The letters were sent to a Major Erskine,
who was Commissioner at Sagar. He forwarded them to Calcutta with a
note that the account given 'agreed with what I have heard from other
sources'. On the 2nd
July he replied asking her to manage Jhansi until a new superintendent
could be sent. Erskine's initiative was not well received by Canning
and he was sent a letter saying that the Governor General did not blame
him for believing the Rani's account but that she would not be protected
if her account was found to be false. Major Ellis had reported in a
telegram that she
had been forced to help the mutineers with guns, men and money. Despite
evidence, other
than the Rani's account, that the assistance had been extracted from her
under duress, this view of her willing assistance seems to have coloured
the official British view of her from thence forward.

Could it be that the word 'forced' in Ellis' telegram was misread or
misreported at the British HQ? Without that word the telegram
would suggest the Rani's complicity. The British would have no reason
to refer back to it and correct the mistake. Could it be that all
that followed pivoted on the one missing word?

The Rani took Erskine's request seriously,
forming a government which included her father and stabilising the situation.
Tapti Roy mentions that she wrote to Datia urging all chiefs 'to check
the disturbances' and told representatives of both Datia and Orchha that
'measures should be taken at Jhansi that no disturbances would occur'.

Almost immediately she had to deal with
a rival claimant to the Raja's throne, and estate. Shortly after the mutineers
left Jhansi, Sadasheo Rao Narain attempted a coup, but was easily foiled,
and taken prisoner. He was taken by the British and sent in to exile
and his property confiscated
after they retook Jhansi (not executed as some say), and released in about 1877.

She defended Jhansi against attacks by
Orchha and Datia. The forces of Orchha laid siege to Jhansi between the 3rd and 22nd
of October whilst claiming to be acting for the British. The British ignored
her pleas for help in defending Jhansi.

As a consequence of these actions against
Jhansi, Lakshmibai was learning the art of generalship and improving the
army and defences of Jhansi. It also obliged her to have contact with the
rebels who were the only force who could provide her with the military
aid she needed. Events were preparing her for the final confrontation with
the British, and, it seems, both unwittingly and unwillingly.

Away from the battlefield and court, she
restored the library of her late husband and encouraged plays at the court,
the theatre having been her late husband's prime interest.

The British Return

By the end of 1857 the British had dealt with
the bigger problems of Delhi and Oudh enabling them to turn their attention
on the smaller ones, like Jhansi. The Rani had received no further communications
from the British. On the 1
January 1858 she wrote to Sir Robert Hamilton to clarify the position
of Jhansi. He made no reply to this communication either.

On the 6th of January, a British force
under Sir Hugh Rose, accompanied by Hamilton, marched northwards towards
Jhansi, mopping up as they went. Having received no clarification, and
knowing of this force advancing towards her, the Rani could only assume,
and prepare for, the worst.

The force approaching Jhansi was not doing
so with the intention of simply replacing the murdered officials. The inhabitants
would have known of how other towns and cities like Delhi and Lucknow had
been treated by the British, not to mention the many anonymous villages
on their path. They had been executing all the mutineers they had captured,
as well as anyone they so much as suspected of being a rebel. Trials, if
they were held, were cursory. Many others had simply been murdered out
of hand. Plundering had been extensive, even at times taking precedence,
for some at least, over military and humane necessity; British wounded
being left to die while plunder was taken. Any who objected to this behaviour
were ignored. Those objecting included Lord Canning, the Governor General,
and Queen Victoria. Dr Thomas Lowe who was the Medical Officer with Rose's
force at Jhansi dismissed such considerations as 'mawkish sentimentality'.
Lowe's opinion of Lakshmibai was typical of many British, she was 'the
Jezebel of India ... the young, energetic, proud, uncompromising Ranee,
and upon her head rested the blood of the [British] slain, and a punishment
as awful awaited her'. (Even Lowe couldn't help but testify to her character.)

Rose's policy towards the rebels is illustrated by this comment
by a Lt. J Bonus in a letter to his parents dated Saugor 13th Feb
1858:-

"I see by the home papers that people think Canning too lenient,
we too think so, but there is no leniency here. Sir Hugh knows
no native language so pays little heed to what a prisoner says.
His first question is 'Was this man taken with arms in his hands?'
If the answer is 'yes', 'Then shoot him' says Sir Hugh."

Hugh Rose was dogged for a while by controversy over the trial
and subsequent execution of 149 mutineers at Sehore. About 650
men had mutinied but had returned to barracks. They were disarmed
and the 149 taken for trial. The trial
itself was summary and the men were almost immediately executed
by being lined up and shot by a firing squad of 150. Some shots
failed to kill outright, others missed, requiring survivors to
be killed by further shootings and by sabre.

Lakshmibai, whatever her previous position
had been, had little choice but to prepare for the worst. She raised a
force of 14,000 volunteers from the population and 1,500 sepoys, made contact
with the rebels, strengthened the defences and otherwise prepared for the
arrival of the British. An intelligence report (quoting from Paul)
dated the 7th Feb 1858 from Sir Robert Hamilton says that:-

Although the Rani proposes not
to fight the British government yet she makes every hostile arrangement.
Six new large guns have been manufactured, carriages for these and old
guns are in the course of construction. About 200 maunds of saltpetre being
purchased in the Gwalior district had been bought into the fort. Gunpowder
is daily made within the fort. Eight gunners from the Moorar rebels were
sent from Kalpi and have been taken into service. They superintend the
manufacturing of brass balls...

It should be noted that even without the approaching
British force, the Rani had every reason to prepare Jhansi's defences not
against the British, but against Jhansi's more aggressive neighbours, Orchha
in particular.

On Feb 14th a proclamation
was issued in the Rani's name calling on Raja's of both Hindu and Moslem
faiths to rebel against the British. If this was authorised by the Rani,
and it seems doubtful, then this is the first definite statement of rebellion
from her. However according to British intelligence reports she had not
made up her mind to definitely oppose them as late as the 15th March. Her
advisors were split, significantly her own father was for resisting the
British force, but she hesitated.

So, irrespective of her own feelings, Lakshmibai was at the nexus
of a set of forces propelling her to rebellion:-

The British were convinced of her guilt, and in any case
were intent on punishing Jhansi.

The townspeople had tasted British rule and were better off
under their own rulers. In addition the British had failed to respect
their customs. They were to say the least unwelcome guests.

Her army, originally raised to defend Jhansi against Orchha, was
predominantly composed of rebels and mutineers for whom surrender
meant death.

More personally, it would seem that her father had ambitions
to recover the Jhansi throne for her.

She had little choice.

The Siege of Jhansi

On 21 March 1858 the British forces started
the siege of Jhansi. See Rose's account
of the siege, also Godse's account.
The town was given the opportunity to surrender but
Lakshmibai had little choice and with the support of the people, refused.
The sepoys she had recruited were mutineers and would have been executed.
It is likely that so would Lakshmibai and anyone else considered to be
a rebel by the British. Further, the people had gained confidence from
the defeat of the siege of the city in October of the year before, and
would have looked forward to aid from the rebels.

There is a suggestion of negotiations from
two sources. Godse mentions a letter that was sent to the Rani requiring
that she and her principal ministers should go to meet 'the Captain' (presumable
Rose) unarmed and unaccompanied. Not unreasonably the Rani declined offering
instead to send the Prime Minister with an armed escort. From the other
side the Aide de Camp to General Rose, a Lieutenant (later General) Lyster
mentions negotiations between the Rani and Sir Robert Hamilton for the
surrender of Jhansi and that Rose was dissatisfied with progress. If there
were such negotiations, and it would be surprising if there were not, the
British left no record of them.

The level of support for Lakshmibai is
shown by the number of volunteers, 14,000, from a population of 250,000.
When one considers the number of families involved, say dividing by six
to give a figure of 42,000, there was a volunteer from at least one in
three families. She also organised the women to keep the troops supplied
at the front line; there must have been many casualties among them. The
British officers observed an enthusiasm and energy in the defending troops
that they had never been able to obtain from their own native soldiers.
Sadly, enthusiasm is no substitute for training, discipline, weaponry and
leadership in the form of qualified officers. Numerically the British were
greatly outnumbered, but militarily they had the advantage.

For 10 days the British bombarded Jhansi
with artillery and maintained a constant fire from the infantry. The bombardment
is said to have been intense, as was the return fire. In actions prior
to this one, the rebels had been able to make good their escape and Rose
was determined that that should not happen this time and had entirely surrounded
Jhansi.

On
the 30th March a breach was forced in the town wall, but before the British
could enter the town, a rebel force of 20,000 under the command of Tatya
Tope arrived. Rose split his forces and met and defeated the rebel force
at the Betwa river a few miles east of Jhansi and north of Orchha.
The rebels lost hundreds, the British less than one
hundred. It was said by a British officer that the rebels neither
asked for quarter nor given quarter. I suspect more the latter than the
former. The rebels would know that the British if they took prisoners,
it was only to execute them, and I doubt that the British were taking prisoners
in any case.

A question arises here as to why Lakshmibai
did not order a sally from the fort and so attack the weakened British
besiegers. Although by splitting his force Rose faced Tope with a
weakened force it meant he was able to maintain the siege and also
lauched a feint on the north of the city. In a letter to his wife
by Major Gall who was in charge of the feint attack gives this brief
account:

"I was not involved in this action [against Tope], being
occupied from daybreak until seven o'clock in attacking with
a nine pounder and a howitzer that part of the city wall opposite
my post, and driving back into the city a party that seemed
disposed to come out."

Rose also took the precaution of withdrawing the forces to
meet Tope under cover of darkness. The defenders of Jhansi
may not have even realised they had gone.

With the defeat of rebel relief force Rose
was able turn his attention back to Jhansi by the 2nd April. At 3am the
next morning, the 3rd April, British troops stormed into Jhansi. The fighting
is said to have been intense with the Rani in the thick of it, as she had
been during the siege when she, with her ladies, was often visible to the
British, directing and encouraging the resistance. At some point she decided
to leave Jhansi. Despite Rose's precautions, during the night of the 3rd
and 4th April she was able to make her escape with a small party which
included her father. Legend has it that she rode with Damodar tied to her
back. How she and her party managed to get through the British lines is
uncertain. Some have it that it was a deliberate ploy by Rose (she was
a bigger danger inside the fort than out), treachery by some of the Indian
soldiers employed by the British, negligence by the British soldiers who
had left their post to loot, sheer audaciousness on the part of Lakshmibai
(she pretended to be leading a party British cavalry and simply rode past
them).

Another audacious young woman, Jhalkari
Korin, is said to have masqueraded as the Rani and was captured as such
by the British. She was unmasked only when she was bought before Rose.
Her fate is uncertain. Devi has it that Rose ordered her execution, whilst
Lebra-Chapman makes no comment on it. More happily in the notes in the
appendix to his fictionalised biography of the Rani, Vrindavan Lal Varma
writes:-

That the Unnao Darawaza was being defended by the members
of the Kori caste under the leadership of Puran Kori is
borne out by history. I verified the truth of this event from
Puran Kori's grandson, who also recounted the story of
Jhalkari's daring and audacious scheme. On the 4th April 1858,
she set out for General Rose's camp and on reaching there
declared with grand aplomb that she was indeed the Rani and
the English were merely wasting their time by looking for her.
Though I did not have the good fortune of meeting her, Jhalkari
Korin died a very old woman...

Rafael Waldburg-Zeil has pointed out that the strength of the
defence of Jhansi may be measured by the number of Victoria
Crosses awarded. The highest British award for valour, seven
were won at Jhansi, six of them on the 3rd April when the town
was stormed. The Chapter One Victoria Cross site shows the
following awards:-

A total of 14 out of 1354 awarded to date. Note that this does
not include any that may have been awarded in other actions
of the Central India Campaign.

To quote a private correspondence from Rafael: "the assault of the
city was not a weekend-walk as we say here and I think it
honors well the heroism of the people of Jhansi and their
desperate fight." In effect, one can judge the quality of
a people by the deeds of their enemy.

The Real Jhansi Massacre

In Jhansi, the slaughter continued. All the
next day the street fighting, looting, destruction and murder continued,
the British soldiers "eagerly exceeding their orders'' (Hibbert). A Hindu
priest, Vishnu Godse, who was there and wrote of his
experiences, 'recalled four days of fire, pillage, murder and
looting without distinction' (Fraser). Rose had instructed his troops to
'spare no one over sixteen - except women of course'. Some of those who
could not escape threw themselves with their wives and children down the
wells of the town. Some to be dragged out again to be bayoneted. In the
words of Godse:

[After the massacre and looting
had finished] In the squares of the city ... hundreds of corpses [were
collected] in large heaps and covered with wood, floorboards and anything
that came handy and set on fire. Now every square blazed with burning bodies
and the city looked like one vast burning ground ... It became difficult
to breathe as the air stank with the odour of burning human flesh and the
stench of rotting animals in the streets.

And according to Dr Lowe they were killed
'in their puffed up thousands ... such was the retribution meted out to
this Jezebel Ranee and her people'. Unfortunately the crime for which this
retribution was so enthusiastically meted out, the massacre of nearly a
year previous, had been committed by a handful of men who had left Jhansi
almost immediately, men who had nothing to do with Jhansi other than that
they had been stationed there by the British. Apart from the 1500 sepoys
recruited to help defend the town, none of those 'punished' had actually
committed a crime against the British. In return for the murder of 61 by,
say, a dozen mutineers, the British murdered, according to their own figures,
4-5,000. Whilst the British claim that they died in battle, it is worth
comparing that figure with the number of British casualties for the siege,
storming and capture of Jhansi - about 100 killed and 250 wounded.

Whilst Godse's account corroborates
the British claim that they killed only the men,
the deaths of women occuring more or less accidentally in general, he reports
four days of indiscriminate slaughter of the men and systematic looting.

(The original mutineers of Jhansi, the
12th Bengal Native Infantry, were actually in Lohari which part of Rose's
force took on the 2nd May. All were killed defending the fort.)

The Rani's Escape

In the meanwhile, the Rani's escape was not
without incident.

I have two accounts of British encounters
with the Rani during her flight. The more famous is that of Lieutenant
Dowker who by his own account pursued her until a shot, possibly fired
by the Rani herself, disabled him. Other, Indian, sources have him wounded
in a sword fight with the Rani at a village called Bhander. The second
account, from Cornet Combe is set in the village of Banda which I assume
is Combe's spelling of Bhander:-

'We sent all over the country
in pursuit [of the Rani] and one of our troops overtook her at a placed
called Banda, 20 miles off. Her escort made a hard fight of it, and though
our fellows did their utmost and killed every man she got away, her smart
saddle falling into our hands."

She rode the 100 miles to Kalpi in 24 hours
and was given a parade of honour on her arrival.

Her father, among others, was not so fortunate,
he was wounded leaving Jhansi, managed to reach Datia but there he was
handed over to the British and hanged in Jokhan Bagh.

The Final Acts of the Rebellion and the Death
of a Rani

A rebel force under Tatya Tope went to Koonch
where Rose, after a delay of 3 weeks to re-supply, went on to meet and
defeat them on 6th May. Rose then advanced on Kalpi. The rebels there were
at a low ebb, but were heartened by the arrival of the Nawab of Banda,
and the nephew of Nana Sahib, Rao Sahib. Encouraged by the reinforcements
and Lakshmibai's promise to fight with them to the end, on the 22nd of
May they attacked the British. Despite being considerably weakened by the
heat and having to fight under the midday sun, the British were able to
defeat the rebels who were forced to retreat again. This time they went
to Godalpur outside of Gwalior. There, rather than disbanding as the British
expected they audaciously decided to take Gwalior. The fort at Gwalior
was considered to be the strongest in India and virtually impregnable.
The ruler, the Maharaja Sindia had maintained a pro-British stance throughout
the Rebellion. If successful the hope of the rebels was that this would
encourage others to throw in their lot with them.

The rebels advanced on Gwalior with 11,000
men and were met at Morar by Maharaja Sindia. After the first shots were
fired, the bulk of the Maharaja's army defected to the rebels, and the
Maharaja left for the safety of Agra. Rao Sahib was crowned at Gwalior
and Lakshmibai was famously given a priceless pearl necklace from the Gwalior
Treasury.

Rose now took his force towards Gwalior.
Lakshmibai was given command of the eastern flank, the most difficult
to defend, and met the British at Kotah-ki-Serai on the 17th June. She
'dressed as a man', that is she dressed as someone going into battle, but
not totally, she also wore her bangles and the pearl necklace. To me this
is a wonderful gesture: to wear a pearl necklace into battle, no wonder
her troops loved her. How she dies, and where, and when, is uncertain -
there are several accounts. Some have her killed on the parapets of Gwalior
in a hail of gunfire at the beginning of the siege, others at Kotah-ki-Serai.
Lord Canning gave the following account in his papers, and this seems to
be considered the most credible:-

Ranee of Jhansi. Killed
by a trooper of the 8th Hussars who was never discovered. Shot in the back,
her horse baulked. She then fired at the man, and he passed his sword through
her. She used to dress like a man (with a turban) and rode like one ...
Not pretty, & pockmarked with smallpox, but beautiful eyes and figure.
She used to wear gold anklets, and Sindia's pearl necklace, plundered from
Gwalior (Sindia says its value is untold). These when dying she distributed
among the soldiery when taken to die under the mango clump... The infantry
attacked the cavalry for allowing her to be killed. The cavalry said she
rode too far in front. Her tent was very coquettish.... Two maids of honour
rode with her. One was killed, and in her agony stripped off her clothes.
Said to have been most beautiful. ... The army mourned [the Rani] for two
days.

[With respect to the dead maid of honour see Hamilton's
account below.

Another similar version by J. Henry Sylvester,
who was at Gwalior, says 'the gallant Queen of Jhansi fell from a carbine
wound, and was carried to the rear, where she expired, and was burnt according
to the custom of the Hindoos'.

Saul David in his Indian Mutiny 1857 draws on the diary of Edward
Grey, Veterinary Surgeon, 8th Hussars, for this account:-

The Rani was on horseback ... when the British cavalry
[8th Hussars] made their surprise appearance, causing her
escort to scatter ... she boldly 'attacked one of the 8th
in their advance, was unhorsed and wounded', possibly by
a sabre cut. A short while later as the British retired
... she recognised her former assailant as she sat bleeding
by the roadside and fired at him with her pistol.
Unfortunately she missed and he 'dispatched the young lady
with his carbine'. But because she was 'dressed as a sowar',
the trooper never realised 'that he had cut off one of the
mainstays of the mutiny, tht there was a reward of a lac
[lakh] on his victim's head, or that at that moment she
was wearing jewels worth a crore of rupees'.

Whilst this account is similar to others and it is entirely
possible for Grey to have been aware of the Rani's identity, it
is not obvious how he knew that she was wearing 'jewels worth a
crore of rupees'. Perhaps in that detail he was repeating rumour.

On the other hand, Sir Robert Hamilton gives this account of
her death in a letter to Sir John Kaye dated 27th Aug 1860:-

She was killed at Gwalior in the corner of the Parade
in the [missing], whereon a cluster of [missing] were
seen. I had always desired that the Enfield Rifle
might fire at them. In this way, a group came on the
Parade, at a Tukeeah whilst the battle was raging but
quite out of shot, however some rifles let drive at
them and they dispersed; two shots had taken effect,
one on the Ranee the other on her attendant. The Ranee
died almost before she was put on a Palkee and hurried
off to a Mundil on the other side of the town ... I
went to the spot with Dr. Christison and collected
bits of bone from the ashes - which he preserved, the
attendant was a Masalmanee, and I had her exhumed,
both were shot in the breast and fatal wounds.

Then there is another account given by a Mr Martin, quite
possibly taken from the remembrances of Damodar Rao, in
these
extracts from some letters
written in 1897.

Mahasweti Devi reports the brief remembrances
of Damodar who was a 10 year old child at the time. One in particular tells of
how one 'evening in Gwalior came back to his mind over and over again when
a loving glance from a pair of enormous eyes seemed to reach out towards
him and then move far off - it was as if his mother was going far away,
where one could no longer touch her.'

Understandably the Rani's funeral was carried
out very quickly after her death since none could guarantee that she would
be dealt with proper respect if they delayed. In Sir Hugh Rose's report
he mentions her funeral and that she was buried 'with great ceremony under
a tamarind tree under the Rock of Gwalior where I saw her bones and ashes'.

Lakshmibai had two 'maids of honour' who
accompanied her from Jhansi; we know little more than their names, Mandar
and Kashi Kumbin. Mandar is said to have been a childhood friend of Lakshmibai
and was killed in the same incident in which Lakshmibai was fatally wounded,
whilst Kashi had stayed behind to look after Damodar. It was Kashi, according
to Devi, who prepared the Rani for her funeral pyre and who with another
close attendant of the Rani's looked after Damodar for two years before
surrendering him to the British with the promise of safety. She then disappears
from history. One has to be impressed by their loyalty and courage. But
then there were many such people even more anonymous, their acts unknown
to history. We can only acknowledge the deeds of a few, and they must also
stand for all these others.

Two days later the rebels left Gwalior
making no attempt to hold what was a virtually impregnable position. The
death of Lakshmibai seems to have utterly demoralised them. The 'impregnable'
fort of Gwalior was easily retaken by the British. To all intents and purposes
the rebellion was over.